So that's why the cheers for the DEC

I'd been wondering for a long time why local supporters of gas drilling had turned into such great fans of New York's Department of Environmental Conservation. Over the years I'd heard plenty of complaints about how the DEC was another terrible government agency out to cause trouble for private property owners on behalf of terrible environmentalists. When it came to gas drilling, though, the DEC suddenly achieved sainthood. Pro-fracking speaker after speaker at public conversations on hydrofracking lauded the great work they did on gas drilling regulation.

Legislators voting with their leadership

Our local legislators were pretty much in lock-step, though the details are different:

Democratic Assemblywoman Barbara Lifton voted with Speaker Sheldon Silver 99.52% of the time, making her the 33rd of 150 most likely to vote with the speaker. She voted with Republican Minority Leader Brian Kolb 88.8% of the time.

Republican State Senator Jim Seward voted with Majority Leader Dean Skelos 98.91% of the time, making him 28th most likely of 62 to vote. He also voted with Democratic Senate Minority Leader John Sampson 97.01% of the time, and Independent Democratic Conference leader Klein 98.36% of the time.

Somehow pretty much none of those numbers seem healthy, but the Senate's apparently total lack of controversy in bills that reached the floor really makes me wonder.

Seward was also on the leader-list for bills passing two houses, at third in the Senate and overall, with 26. It's hard to tell if that's because of his legislative skills, or because of the way his district is drawn to overlap various municipalities. Over two years, he's had 47 bills passed, putting him in a three-way tie for fifth overall.

There's a lot more there if you're looking for what quantitative measures are possible for our legislature.

July 5, 2012

4700 gallons of hydrochloric acid, but it's not about fracking?

When the anonymous industry report states there were "no drilling or fracking operations taking place" at the spill site in Leroy, it's somehow excluding the handling and storage of hazardous materials that are central to those operations. In short, the cause and outcome of this particular spill, like the impact of large scale fracking operations over time, are made obscure by industry-speak. This 4,700 gallon "release" is, once again, something to keep in mind when you hear that fracking has never polluted groundwater.

July 7, 2012

Economic development by paying down (individual) debt

Long long ago I won an Empire State Scholarship, but couldn't accept the money that came with it because I went to college in another state - Pennsylvania. In the long run I did something more important to New York than going to college there, deciding to live here. (In the 20 years since I graduated from college I've lived in New York State for 18.)

Remember how towns in need of a shot of youthful energy were dangling a tasty carrot of student loan payoffs in front of said young people to try and convince them to move there? It seems Niagara Falls' plan in that vein is doing quite well for itself, with a new report that young people from around the country are "vying for the chance to live in downtown Niagara Falls."

As the Buffalo News puts it for those unfamiliar with the plan, "No, that's not a typo." It's all part of the city's scheme to pay off up to $3,500 for two years in student loans for those accepted into the program. More than 200 people from as far away as Hawaii have contacted the city about renting or buying a home in the city since news of the program spread last month.

This is pretty radical, though they're only doing it for 20 people.

I have mixed feelings about this. The student loan business has turned into a racket over the last few decades, fueled by rising demand for credentials. Organizations, both not-for-profit and for-profits, have been chasing student loan dollars in ways that constantly make me wonder what students - and taxpayers subsidizing those loans - are actually getting for the money. An expensive education can certainly be worthwhile, but it's not always the right answer. (I marvel at Angelika's college education, which cost €250 a semester, mostly for a bus pass. There are other probably better models.)

It's also hard to track the impact of this, though the good publicity Niagara Falls is getting as a pioneer probably helps overall. I also have persisting doubts about the "chase the 'Creative Class'" approach that seems to have become a standard part of too many cities' economic development toolbox. (They're the most mobile people, so getting them to come and getting them to stay are two different questions, the second much more difficult.)

I think, though, that we're going to see more of this. It's definitely something to watch. At the very least, it's an interesting idea for making lemons into lemonade.

July 11, 2012

Garden tour and much more

Cathy Wakeman's Dryden Town Talk is full of things to do. There's a garden tour this Saturday, Junior Fire Academy next week, a llama and snake coming to Southworth Library, "Homesteading & the Lost Arts" at 4-H Acres, and music all over town.

We present geochemical evidence from northeastern Pennsylvania showing that pathways, unrelated to recent drilling activities, exist in some locations between deep underlying formations and shallow drinking water aquifers. Integration of chemical data (Br, Cl, Na, Ba, Sr, and Li) and isotopic ratios (87Sr/86Sr, 2H/H, 18O/16O, and 228Ra/226Ra) from this and previous studies in 426 shallow groundwater samples and 83 northern Appalachian brine samples suggest that mixing relationships between shallow ground water and a deep formation brine causes groundwater salinization in some locations.

The strong geochemical fingerprint in the salinized (Cl > 20 mg/L) groundwater sampled from the Alluvium, Catskill, and Lock Haven aquifers suggests possible migration of Marcellus brine through naturally occurring pathways. The occurrences of saline water do not correlate with the location of shale-gas wells and are consistent with reported data before rapid shale-gas development in the region; however, the presence of these fluids suggests conductive pathways and specific geostructural and/or hydrodynamic regimes in northeastern Pennsylvania that are at increased risk for contamination of shallow drinking water resources, particularly by fugitive gases, because of natural hydraulic connections to deeper formations. (Emphasis added.)

I'm sure the gas companies and friends will think the italicized part of that is critical - these connections weren't created by drilling. However, the most important part is the bold - these connections already exist. We don't know where they are or how they work, but there is opportunity for migration of fluids and especially gases.

Establishing a Deer Management Focus Area in central Tompkins County to intensify use of hunting to assist communities in the Ithaca area with the burden of overabundant deer populations. The focus area program is established to reduce total deer populations within the focus area by providing more time and more tags to hunters who can gain access to huntable land.

DEC plans to evaluate this new approach over the next several years and, depending on the results, will consider designation of other locations as deer management focus areas. More information about the focus area program, including registration forms will be available on the DEC website in September.

My main question is "huntable land" in "central Tompkins County"? There isn't a whole lot that's huntable by the usual rules. I don't know if they plan to suspend some of the rules, or if they're hoping more people will hunt in the adjacent areas (say, western Dryden) and the deer population might consider migration.

I'm sure this will add to the cranky conversations around Cayuga Heights and its efforts to deal with seemingly infinite deer. Even a lot of the land bordering "central Tompkins County" is Cornell Plantations and similarly protected land. I guess people could hunt on the research fields?

So is Bradley Field, the petroleum engineer and drilling proponent who can't remember if he is a climate change denier; the holder of a singularly influential position to determine the outcome of shale gas development in New York state as the issuer of permits and the overseer of regulations -- Is this Bradley Field nonpartisan? It's a relevant question. Elected officials come and go. (Field has already served under five governors.) The policy being derived under Field's long and unchallenged tenure with the DEC will be enduring.

"Cayuga Operating Company intends to take all steps within its control to avoid permanently retiring the facility by continuing to explore any and all alternatives with its suppliers and other parties, including reductions in its variable and fixed costs," wrote Jerry Goodenough, the company's chief operating officer.

Goodenough cited wholesale electricity prices that "are inadequate for the Cayuga facility to operate economically." The mothballing, he wrote, is a way to put the plant in "protective lay-up to limit the costs that are incurred at the facility."

This will mean a lot fewer trains through the city of Ithaca, which also makes me worry about the long-run future of that track and because of that, the Cargill Salt mine - does anything else move on that line?

Donating our yellow jackets to science

Angelika noticed a growing nest of yellow jackets under the eaves of our house. It's been a few years since we had lots of them, but this nest was probably softball size and you could see a small army of wasps flying around by the gutter, closer to our back door than made me comfortable.

I was about to run out and buy a spray bottle of insecticide, though I hate doing that. Spraying this side of the house isn't likely to contaminate the beehives on the other side, but the bees have enough trouble. Fortunately, I remembered a poster I'd seen at the Varna Community Center, and ran down to look at it.

Seeking yellow jackets and wasps.

I emailed Kevin Loope, and he wrote back quickly. He scouted out the nest, and it would work, so he came back with a lot more equipment. Angelika got a series of pictures through one of our windows. (Sorry - I definitely need to clean the storm window!)

Collecting the yellow jackets with a vacuum.

Collecting the nest itself.

Taking the nest away.

I suspect this is a limited-time offer, and I'm not sure how many nests they really need, but it was great to have a better solution than spraying toxic chemicals on my house. (I suspect that much of the blurry stuff on that window is from past sprayings, too.)

These guys are in some ways more
challenging than working with honeybees, in that they are typically much more
aggressive than honeybees, and studying them requries finding new nests each year.
Plus, their biology is much more poorly understood, which makes it both more
exciting and challenging to study their behavior and ecology.

Seeking yellow jackets and wasps. (Photo from Kevin Loope)

I've attached a photo
of a nest in observation boxes I have set up, and here's a link to a video of a fascinating behavior I'm currently
investigating, when workers kill their queen in some colonies. They are like
honeybees in many ways, though there is much more conflict among colony members over
who gets to reproduce, and in some colonies this appears to lead to outright
violence!

Kevin also adds:

I'll be collecting nests this year and again next year, so if folks want to contact me, they can email at kjloope@gmail.com.

I agree that New York Republicans were never as far right as Republicans elsewhere. There certainly were self-described conservatives among them, but I've heard from a fair number of 'classic' or 'standard' Upstate Republicans that their party left them behind in its rightward march. They aren't necessarily excited about converting, but the Republican label is less exciting for them than it used to be.

The other piece is sadder, though. I've seen a few times among my friends from high school in Corning and in conversation in Dryden that a lot of kids moved south when they finished school. At least in my circles, I see more folks on the right making that move. The numbers I have aren't statistically significant, of course. However, I suspect that if you grow up under a constant barrage of stories about how leftists are ruining New York State, and in particularly Upstate's economy, then leaping to "right-to-work" states that seem to be growing is an appealing option.

Overall, I suspect lots of things are combining to create this long-term shift, especially Upstate. Republicans have difficult choices here.

(And Democrats have different challenges. I often wonder how long the status quo can last for either party.)

Lenape respectfully requests that your office, as the regulatory body with authority over Lenape's oil and gas industry activities in New York State, take the following actions: (1) advise the Towns that the Law Prohibiting Natural Gas is an illegal and unenforceable act; (2) affirm to Lenape that its lawful conduct of operations under the exclusive authority of New York State law will not subject Lenape, its agents, employees or contractors to local enforcement proceedings, including fines and imprisonment, under the Law Prohibiting Natural Gas; and (3) acting through the Office of the New York State Attorney General or on your own volition, take legal action to extinguish the Law Prohibiting Natural Gas provisions in conflict with the ECL or the complex oil and natural gas regulatory scheme administered by the Department.

If the state doesn't do what Lenape wants, buying completely into arguments that have lost in court twice so far, then Lenape "may initiate legal action". Somehow I don't expect that Lenape would win that action.

I thought Anschutz's lawsuit against Dryden was obnoxious, but this is a whole new category of shamelessness.